


Language Barrier Sidestepped

by bluespring864



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: First Kiss, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-01
Updated: 2018-08-01
Packaged: 2019-06-20 03:49:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15525408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluespring864/pseuds/bluespring864
Summary: For the first time ever, Yuzuru Hanyu was grateful for a fall on the ice. Very grateful, even.He heard laughter (Javi’s, familiar and close, so close, as well as the audience’s, further away and a bit tinny) but he did not care. His mind was whirling.





	Language Barrier Sidestepped

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scrappybook](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scrappybook/gifts).



> Just a short little something, because I recently discovered this pairing and am reading through all the amazing stories here on the AO3. Also finally trying my hand at a one-shot again, instead of starting another story that gets completely out of hand length-wise...  
> I realized too late that Shoma Uno wasn’t at Fantasy on Ice 2018, so in this story he is. The rest of it is invented anyway, so it shouldn’t matter all that much ;-)  
> I know this story isn’t much of anything, but I’d really love to get some comments anyway, because I’m greedy like that.
> 
> Gifted to scrappybook (provided you don't hate it) - I adore your story “Sun and Sea”, and would love for you to write more!

For the first time ever, Yuzuru Hanyu was grateful for a fall on the ice. Very grateful, even.

He heard laughter (Javi’s, familiar and close, so close, as well as the audience’s, further away and a bit tinny) but he did not care. His mind was whirling.

They’d just been about to finish one of the first performances of Fantasy on Ice 2018. The second half of the final musical number was playing, everybody was on the ice, and, as always, the choreography was starting to fall apart. They were reaching the point where everyone would have one last lap around the rink; one last chance to show off.

As they came out of the practiced sync movements and skated over to join the group, while Tessa and Scott were already starting in on the individual laps, Javi leaned in, a hand on Yuzu’s shoulder.

“I don’t know if I like it less or more, skating with you. I mean, now that we won’t compete against each other again.”

Yuzu stopped abruptly, the words hitting hard. He should be used to the idea by now, he told himself, but he emphatically wasn’t.

Javi immediately covered for Yuzu’s little lapse. He turned to skate backwards, throwing Yuzu a look, and continued towards the group. Yuzu forced himself to follow before he’d attract attention; still lost for words. His belated reply came out slightly breathless, a bit whiny, maybe even desperate – a tone of voice he hated hearing on himself.

“Still do not think I can do it without you.”

This time it was Javi who almost stopped, but then caught himself a second later and continued his skate, while words spilled out of him rapidly.

“Oh, no, no, no digas eso, _querido_ …”

And that was when Yuzuru Hanyu, two time Olympic champion – two time back-to-back Olympic champion, to be precise – slipped and fell. Out of a perfectly calm forwards skate without any kind of footwork.

It must have been the shock that made him lose his balance.

Because he did hardly know any Spanish, but ‘ _querido_ ’ – that he knew.

It was one of the words he’d looked up when he was a seventeen year old boy with a massive crush on his incredible teammate Javier Fernandez. One of the words he’d whispered to himself at night, imagining how Javi would say it.

So, Yuzu was grateful for the fall, even if he could hardly envision a more stupid way to kiss the ice. But it did hide his face for the crucial seconds it took to school his expression, and that was all that counted.

As he got up quickly, pulling a hopefully cute face and moving his shoulders into an exaggerated shrug for the benefit of the audience, he realized that Javi’s laughter had quieted already.

Barely a second later, he felt strong hands on his shoulders, and looked up into a picture of worry.

“Is it your ankle?”, Javi asked, and Yuzu’s head spun with a jumble of words that in English might have translated roughly to ‘holy hell and damnation, why does he have to be so fucking nice, fucking good, fucking beautiful as well…’. Just because he usually strove to be polite on the outside, didn’t mean those words weren’t stored somewhere in his brain.

“Ankle’s fine,” he murmured with another smile, one that he hoped was convincing.

“If you say so,” Javi replied, distractedly. He was watching Stéphane Lambiel gesture towards them, his hands making some kind of shooing motion, and the next words from Javi were,

“Oh shit.”

Yuzu hadn’t even started giggling when Javi was already gone.

Their discussion had taken more time than he’d realized, and it was definitely Javi’s turn to skate now. Probably had been for half a minute. Yuzu watched as his friend rushed forward, launched himself into the air, stumbled a bit coming out of his quad sal, but still managed to pull off the landing.

Yuzu moved on autopilot when it was his turn. Only when he skated back to the group, and saw that special smile he was always looking out for, did he notice he’d gone for his delayed axel plus triple axel tonight, which Javi loved.

Retrospectively, Yuzu felt proud for landing those jumps with a complete lack of focus. It must have been muscle memory. And a healthy dose of luck.

 _Querido_ , he thought to himself as Javi’s blinding smile faded slowly, but lingered in the lines around his eyes.

~---~

As soon as they were off the ice and in the corridor to the changing rooms, everybody started teasing Yuzuru about his fall; those who hadn’t seen it throwing in questions about what had happened.

“Yuzu looking Javi and just fall on face,” Shoma said brightly, in his approximate English, and the girls all giggled.

“Yuzu always looking Javi,” someone was saying, parroting Shoma, and Yuzu felt his face turn red. There was an arm on his shoulder again, and even though Javi looked at the floor for a second, apparently embarrassed as well, he simply murmured,

“Come on, let’s go. Let them talk.”

 _Querido_.

The word was still in his head, and suddenly Yuzu felt daring.

“Give them more to talk, _querido_?” he whispered back, probably murdering the pronunciation, but succeeding in making Javi’s eyes go very big.

“Did I…?”

“Yes,” Yuzu replied simply, cutting Javi off. He cupped that handsome face right in front of him – how had he resisted temptation for so long? – and carefully pressed their foreheads together.

He heard giggles and whispers and gasps around them and tuned them out.

“What are you doing?”

Javi sounded very calm, as if, even though he’d just asked about it, he was absolutely fine with what was going on.

“Do you think crush can last six years?”

As he responded to the question with a question of his own, Yuzu’s voice was barely audible; for Javi’s ears only. _Please let no-one overhear this._

“No?”

Oh, Javi sounded even more cute when he was confused.

“Then I am little bit in love with you, I think.”

Yuzu had no idea why he was suddenly so sure of himself, why he could say words that would have been impossible yesterday, or even an hour ago, but he certainly didn’t mind this newfound confidence.

He felt and saw Javi lean back a bit, breaking the skin contact, his eyes so dark, so round when they focused on Yuzu, his mouth slightly agape. Shocked, but not retreating further.

With a little sigh, Yuzu leaned in and placed his lips on Javi’s, where they belonged.

The onlookers around them reacted with cheering, mock-disgust, and more than a few ‘finallys’, and in that moment, Yuzu hated his impulsiveness, and their audience, because for a second he couldn’t focus on the kiss.

Then, there was the light, tentative counterpressure of Javi’s lips against his, and he forgot everything.

When they resurfaced, a minute and an eternity later, the corridor around them was empty, and that was enough to make Yuzu understand the enormity of what he’d just done.

They were gone now, but nearly twenty gossip-prone figure skaters had just seen him kiss Javier Fernandez, who had never even hinted at liking men. Yuzu hadn’t come out either, but he was pretty sure most people in the skating community had guessed by now. Javi, however, had had girlfriends, and girlfriends only.

“God, so sorry.”

Yuzu’s whispered words rang out far too loudly in the deserted corridor.

“I’m not.”

Javi had a smile on his face again, a small private one this time, but it wasn’t less blinding for that. Yuzu was mesmerized, couldn’t help but keep looking into that sun. But still…

“I outed you.”

This was a topic he was well versed in in English, having listened quietly for years to so many skaters discussing it on evenings off. Some of the stories had been quite heartbreaking. With a sudden rush of panic, Yuzu imagined Javi retreating, telling him that he wasn’t gay, that this was a mistake…

However, “And yourself, as well,” was the only thing Javi countered, managing somehow to look more worried about that than about his own fate. Yuzu waved his concern away with a dismissive hand gesture and a mocking tone.

“Yes, big surprise.”

“I, for one, didn’t know.”

Javi’s reply was immediate, the look in his eyes bashful, as if he was apologizing for his obliviousness.

“Well, now you do.”

Yuzu wiggled his eyebrows, and reveled in the fact that he succeeded in making Javi laugh. A quiet chuckle at first, then a loud magical sound; his head thrown back. As he quieted down, Javi leaned in again; brushed his thumbs over Yuzu’s cheeks. He’d done that before, but, oh, now every touch felt like so much more, and promised even more than that.

“Did I really call you _querido_ , before?”

“Yes.”

Yuzu grinned happily, his heart so full he felt it might burst.

“Oh,” Javi said, his eyes sparkling with realization, “that is when you fell. _Querido_.”

A second later, he yelled a half-hearted ‘ouch’, because Yuzu had boxed him on the arm.

Then, on a whim, Yuzu decided to pull out one of the other Spanish terms of endearment he remembered.

“Don’t even think you can mock me, mi corazón.”

The look on Javi’s face was a mixture of bafflement and delight he would wear often in the months and years to come.

Yuzu enjoyed it immensely.

He was sure he’d never grow tired of it.

Or Javi.


End file.
